Mission Organization

I am not the most organized of people. I LOVE organized spaces, and I have lots of ideas about organization, but somewhere in the execution of it all is where I get into trouble. It is January, and so it is time to readdress the issue. (I don’t know if I would call it a New Years Resolution as much as a necessity for our survival). And let's be honest--it is really hard to decorate cluttery rooms, so in that spirit, I am joining Thrifty Décor Chick’s “Mission Organization.”


And, yes, Sarah (Thrifty Décor Chic), I HAVE TOO MUCH STUFF!
Moving along…

Part 1-Laundry Room Remedies

These are actually Christmas presents I gave to my sister this year. Believe it or not, she asked for laundry baskets like the ones I have from IKEA to organize the clean clothes in the laundry room. But I couldn't just give her laundry baskets, so I had to embellish, a little. I had a friend with a Cricut, cut their names in vinyl. Since my sis is kind of a spunky girl, I did lime green boxes with white wording for the boys, and white boxes with lime green wording for the girls (no boredom in that laundry room). She was thrilled!

While I was at it, I had letters cut for my laundry basket/boxes.

And here they are in my laundry room. (Yes, Tessa’s basket is way too full! I’d love to hear ideas on organizing baby clothes, they go through them so fast, I can’t keep on top of it!)

I’m pretty sure everything in this picture came from IKEA. The bookshelf was originally used as a bookshelf in our house, but when I realized it fit two of my baskets perfectly, it found a new home in the laundry room. We removed the bottom couple of shelves so that the hampers could fit below and out of the way. I'd like to eventually mural a fun clothesline on the wall with colorful retro-looking clothes, to tie-in the colorful baskets---Oops! This post is supposed to be about organization, not decorating!

While the labels make things look fun, I think they go a long way toward making routines accessible for the whole family.

Part Two--Making the Time

One of the biggest challenges I face when organizing is finding the time to do it AND making time in our daily schedules for the routines that keep things from getting out of hand again the next day. Sometimes it seems so overwhelming, that I just don’t know where to start. Decision-making can be painstaking for me, so I’ve come-up with an idea that I think will be helpful for our current schedule: A predetermined focus for each day of the week. I have done this kind of thing in the past and it has been very helpful, but this time I have taken inspiration from blogland, assigning each day an alliterating name (a la “Wordless Wednesday” or “Tackle it Tuesday”) so that it will be super-easy for me to remember what I am supposed to be doing each day. (Keep in mind, I have a one-year-old, so I can’t be too lofty with my ambitions.)

Weekly Schedule--Daily focus

MONDAY
Meal-planning Monday
Figure out the menu for the week and shop for groceries.

Manage-it Monday
Return emails, phone calls, update calendar.

TUESDAY
Tackle-It Tuesday
Basic cleaning of entire house. Flylady calls this the Weekly Home Blessing. Tuesday is good because I have voice students on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. Nice to have the house looking like it isn't a Federal Disaster area before they come!

WEDNESDAY
PaperWork Wednesday
Pay any bills that have come in during the week. Sort, purge, shred, and file paper clutter.

Wash Day Wednesday
Laundry is an everyday thing, but on Wash day, I can make sure clean clothes are all put away, clean the laundry area, and catch-up if I've fallen behind. What about Ironing? It would be a good day for that too, if we actually believed in ironing in our home.

THURSDAY
Thorough Thursday
I will pick one room that needs the most help and give it a thorough cleaning, OR work on serious de-cluttering in one room/area that day.

Triple Threat Thursday
I teach a theatre class for kids on Thursday nights, so I need to prep for that on Thursday, as well.

FRIDAY
Funday Friday
I work on my blog and on creative projects I WANT to do. Those things can be a reward for making it through the week, and I'll still be productive. Hopefully, Friday Funday can also mean date night. We haven't had one of those for a while.

SATURDAY
Screwdriver Saturday
Enlist hubby's help to install, fix, build, hammer, whatever, the things on the to do list...it's really long, right now.

Special-Day Saturday
Growing-up, we sang a song in church that goes "Saturday is a special day, it's the day we get ready for Sunday." Since we don't shop on Sundays, that might mean a quick trip to the grocery store, or filling up the gas tank, but for us it also means preparing our primary lesson (we teach the 10-12 year-olds at church), and getting the kids all clean with their Sunday clothes laid out. Now, with 9:00am church, we'll never be on time if we don't do some Saturday prep.

SUNDAY
Sabbath Day
Aside from church and spending time as a family. I think Sunday's will be good days to work on my family blog. It is kind of our journal/scrapbook/personal history, and a way to stay in touch with our friends and family, so I think it should be updated at least once-a-week!

I'm feeling more organized already!

I realize that I won't be able to stick to the schedule each day, since life happens, so this is not intended to make me feel guilty when I fall short, but rather to give me direction each day, and save my brain the effort of deciding which fire to put out first.

I'm sure organized people are great party throwers, so I'm hoping all of you visiting from Thrifty Decor Chick, will come back on Thursday for my Blogoversary Party Party! If you don't know what that is, go here for more details: